Biography
Hiroyuki Sasaki is the founder, chairman and executive director of the Japanese fashion powerhouse, Tomorrowland.
Sasaki grew up near the port of Yokohama and after graduation, he joined a local textiles trading company. Soon, he would decide to break into the fashion world with his own label, citing the “American look” that was widely popular in japanese culture at the time as the source of his inspiration. In his fusion of western and eastern style, quality has always been key for Sasaki who develops his fabrics using traditional methods like kiryu orimono, a homespun tweed technique. The fabrics were used for the Tomorrowland menswear brand, which he launched in 1978, at the age of 30, opening the first store in Aoyama, Tokyo. Decades later, the brand still operates as a point of contact between cultures, informing its plans to debut “Tomorrowland Records” selling CDs, and tapping into Italian car racing and launching more collaborations with artists overseas.
Tomorrowland has since grown to become an empire, with over 100 stores throughout Japan, in cities including Tokyo, Kyoto, Fukuoka, Nagoya and Kobe. Tomorrowland also manages stores in Japan for western brands like Acne Studios , Dries Van Noten , James Perse, Golden Goose and Isabel Marant , whom Sasaki has known for 20 years. Tomorroland has also expanded its retail locations to Milan and Paris.
In 2015, the first overseas freestanding Tomorrowland store opened on Broome Street in New York, while the brand further established itself in its homebase, opening another store in the newly renovated Nihombashi Sakaijimaya shopping complex. There and at five other new locations and its online store, the brand now offers its original range of children’s clothing, Tomorrowland Boys & Girls. Tomorrowland is currently stocked by global retailers including Mr Porter and MatchesFashion.com.